Nick Taylor has a pro's drive

Nick Taylor has a pro's drive

Nick Taylor plays his tee shot on the ninth hole during the third round of the 109th U.S. Open on the Black Course at Bethpage State Park in New York in 2009.Photo by
File photo

Nick Taylor is so nice and wholesome, there was a time swing coach Rob Houlding actually wondered if his star student had the fire in his belly to survive, let alone thrive, against pros.

Being the Royal and Ancient’s best amateur in the world for 21 weeks last summer as the University of Washington senior was quite an accomplishment. But it won’t mean a thing to the pros he will be battling with for purse money in a few months.

Houlding was convinced Taylor will handle it fine when he watched him in a short-game competition among his Washington Huskies teammates. Taylor was winning the competition, but in one drill he kept hitting the ball into a trap and lost the lead.

He gave himself a tongue lashing, including some words Houlding had never before heard him utter. “He had a mini meltdown,” said Houlding, still surprised in the retelling.

“Then he went to work and won the competition. It was really something.

“There’s this internal drive in there that’s not visible on the outside. Even if he looks as if he’s got a laid-back demeanour, there’s a lot going on. Really, you can’t get the results he has had without that internal competitive drive.

“He is, absolutely, one of a kind. Nick has an amazing base to work from and a great attitude. He’ll get better for 10 years, at least.”

Last year he won four individual NCAA titles, shot an amateur record-tying 65 and finished 36th as the low amateur in the U.S. Open at Bethpage Black against as good a professional field as you’ll see and was runner-up in the U.S. Public Links. He won the U.S. Open sectional qualifier and the Sahalee Amateur. He was third in the Canadian Am.

Washington coach Matt Thurmond has a similar belief in the well disguised toughness of his Abbotsford star and team captain.

“In January after Christmas break, I asked Nick to talk to his teammates,” said Thurmond. “He told them a story how when he was leading the NCAA regional tournament in the last round when he got to the par three 16th hole and hooked a six iron into the water and ended up taking a quad (four over par) and lost the tournament (to fellow Canadian Matt Hill).

“He said he went out and practised hitting six irons. Bucketfuls of range balls and told himself, over and over, that was never going to happen again. Then he got to the U.S. Open qualifying and hit his six iron so good he made a couple of birdies hitting it close. So he was trying to hit tee shots that would put him in six-iron range.

“It gave me chills listening to him tell that because I hadn’t heard it before. To me, that shows an inner fire that burns very, very brightly.”

Taylor will find it difficult to repeat last year’s remarkable season because he has the added distractions of hiring an agent, deciding when to turn pro and other matters that threaten his focus on just playing his final spring as a Husky and as an amateur.

“It raises the stakes and could cloud the head a little bit,” said Thurmond, although he admitted Taylor probably worries about that less than Thurmond himself does.

Taylor says one of his goals before graduation is winning the NCAA individual title and the team title with the Huskies. “That would be great to be able to do that.”

Not winning the Public Links and missing the cut at the U.S. Amateur were disappointments last year, but the highs far outnumbered the lows. From afar it looked as if he might have played too many events.

“There were five or six weeks in a row there,” he said, “but I’m not going to blame being tired for anything that happened. Looking back I’d probably do the same thing.”

It isn’t that Taylor doesn’t think about turning pro, it’s more that he doesn’t see any urgency. The U.S. Amateur (beginning the week of Aug. 23) is just down the road at Chambers Bay in Tacoma so he is considering waiting until at least after that to make the move. If there’s no compelling reason to do it sooner, what indeed is the hurry?

“Odds are,” said Taylor, “I’m going to have to go to (PGA Tour) Q School, anyway. What’s two or three months?”

As yardsticks, he uses Ricky Fowler, Cam Tringale and Billy Horschel — college players against whom he competed successfully. All negotiated their way through Q School.

“I think Nick’s pretty simple,” said Thurmond. “He just wants to play golf. He doesn’t care about being a superstar. You don’t have to worry about him getting caught up in all that stuff.”

And he proved in the U.S. Open last year when he fired that five under 65 at Bethpage that he can play with the very best players in the world. In fact, guys like Houlding and Thurmond suggest that the tougher the competition, the more he relishes it.

Jay Taylor, Nick’s proud father who has been there every step of the way, says: “I don’t give a rip if he ever turns pro. If it works out he can play in the B.C. Amateur he might do that.”

The elder Taylor says Nick will ultimately make his own decisions, but they have talked to former Husky teammate Alex Prugh and Chris Baryla of Vernon on fact-finding missions.

“He chose to go all the way through school,” said Jay, “if he’s going to consider it (pro golf) as a career, he’ll approach it as a journey.”

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